What is #MyMama All About?

#MyMama is an inspiration. #MyMama makes the world a better place. #MyMama is a force for change. #MyMama encourages me to care no matter what. #MyMama is LOVE.

We can all agree that mamas are special. They’re nurturers, teachers, comforters, and leaders–often all at once. We see this everyday in our work and are constantly encouraged by how mamas encourage and drive our successes.

This Mother’s Day, PCI offers you the opportunity to give your mama a gift as inspiring as she is. Your donation to PCI in her honor helps us ensure more women and girls have access to basic health needs, education, equal rights and opportunity, and encouragement to become community leaders and business owners.

When you make your gift to PCI you’ll have the opportunity to send your mama a custom e-card and let her know that she’s the reason more women and girls around the world will have a chance at a brighter future.

We also think your own mama is special, and we want to hear all about her! Tell us your favorite memory of your mama, a lesson she taught you, a time she was selfless, the moment you realized how hard she works – we want to hear it all. You can honor your mama on social media by:

Sharing a photo of your mama on Twitter and filling in the blank: #MyMama is ___________

Posting a photo of your mama and a story on Instagram – don’t forget to tag @PCIGlobal!

If you need a little inspiration to show how amazing your mama is, here’s an incredible story from our own Bonnie Maratea:

#MyMama was born in Panama in 1946. Her family moved to the rural southern US some years later, where her only career options were to become a secretary or a teacher. She chose the latter and was teaching in South Carolina public schools when they were finally forcefully desegregated in the early 1970s (yes, it was that backwards).

She went on to have three children by a Vietnam veteran who was often violent and abusive. On the last day of school in 1984, #MyMama packed up her kids and what belongings she could, and left. She was a single mom who worked three jobs to scrape by, but she was safe, and her children never knew how hard it was for her to pull off.

#MyMama taught me self-respect, humility, courage, the notion of sacrifice, the value of hard work, and the importance of contributing to a larger cause. She was only 42 when she passed away and never saw her kids grow up, but she is with me every day.

#MyMama was an empowered woman who inspired me to become one as well. It is my mission in this world to pass along the same lessons to my daughter. Together, we can change the options that are available to women and girls – family by family, group by group, community by community – so that we all have the freedom to reach our potential and the capacity to live a happy life.